Gazing at all the photographs of those who had been tortured and executed we struggled to hold back the tears. In 1975 the Khmer Rouge under the leadership of Pol Pot, began a four year reign of terror in Cambodia that took an estimated 2 million lives. Thousands of those souls who died during that time spent their last days at the infamous Toul Sleng prison in Phnom Penh which is now a museum of genocidal crime.

This former high school has been left in the state the invading Vietnamese found it when they liberated Phnom Penh from the Khmer Rouge in 1979. It’s said that the Vietnamese found it by following the odour of decaying flesh. It must have been an unimaginably horrific sight. Room after room of cramped cells and torture chambers where the Khmer Rouge extracted false confessions from innocent civilians by torturing them in ways that are unspeakable.

While we were visiting the prison we had the privilege of meeting one of the few survivors of Toul Sleng. Chum Mey was arrested, tortured and forced to confess to working for the CIA which he had never heard of before. It was his skill as a motor mechanic that saved him from being sent to the killing fields outside of Phnom Penh to be executed

Even though the visit to this prison was a desperately sad one, we used it to talk with the youth at NaCE about the difficult issue of forgiveness.Kang Kek Lew, the former director of Toul Sleng Prison is well known by all Cambodians as ‘Comrade Duch’. He is currently serving a life sentence for crimes against humanity committed at Toul Sleng. But what is less known about Duch is that in 1996 he become a Christian. So I asked the youth; “If a man convicted of crimes against humanity can find forgiveness from God through the death of his Son Jesus, then how can we not forgive those who sin against us?”

I later learnt that Chris LePel, the minister through whom Duch came to faith in Jesus had himself lost family members and friends at Toul Sleng. He is reported to have told the court at Duch’s trial in 2009 that he had forgiven Duch for what he had done. That’s worth remembering when we are finding forgiveness hard.

Today, after 5 months of being PIrates (both here in Cambodia and back at home in Australia), the end of the Pirate theme has arrived! (Our Kids church team back in Australia will appreciate the significance of this….)

Actually, its sad to say farewell to the pirates. The kids here have all loved singing ‘Are you serving Captain Jesus‘ each day. In fact, while we were going around the island out in the province last Saturday, 3 of the kids from the Holiday program together with our kids were singing the entire song as loud as they could while being driving around in their tuk tuk through the villages…actions and all!

Over the past weeks, we’ve all had so much fun playing lots of games, acting, face-painting, and hearing from the Bible about a treasure that is better than gold or silver. With Captain Bunny becoming a Christian today, there were celebrations all around.

Being the last day for Pirates,  the kids all enjoyed playing ‘Choose your treasure’ for the last time where they could all go home with a piece of Danielle’s treasure that she bought for our Holiday club in Australia back in April….Thanks Danielle! (BTW, we’re so excited to hear about the safe arrival of your girls. Praise God! Hope you’re all going really well!)

We’ve really enjoyed teaching the Youth too. They have been very obliging and keen to do all the crazy things we ask them, like eating through milo, jelly, weetbix and blowing out flour to find memory verses, building tall towers using straws, marshmellows and boxes for the tower of Babel, putting together our Bible overview pictures each day after singing our Bible overview song, actions and all…and the list goes on and on. Thanks to Mike Dicker for all your ideas for Youth group, they love them over here.

It’s amazing how we can all enjoy hanging out even without a common language. It certainly helps that we see the youth 6 times a week. The football matches have been a great way for us to do something social too.

Well, next week, we start with our Superhero theme at the Kids Program. It’ll be interesting to see how that goes. I think we’ll need to educate the kids on some of our more recent superheroes. Not so sure they’ve ever heard of ‘Silver surfer!’ Well….we’ll see how it goes!

On one of our days off last weekend we travelled to Kampong Chhnang province, 100km north of Phnom Penh. We were invited by a member of the church to visit the province with his family to see the work he is doing there with World Vision.

So we packed 4 adults and 12 children into a 15 seat van plus the driver (yes it was a little cramped) and we travelled for a few hours along a very busy bumpy road to the province. The area we were visiting was an island in the middle of the Tonle Sap River so we pilled out of the bus and into a much more spacious boat for a half an hour trip across to the island.

We spent the rest of the day travelling in two oversized tuk tuks around the island. On the way around we visited an orphanage run by some local Christians. We spent a few hours singing songs and playing games with about 20 orphans ranging in age from about 5 to 15.

We thought that we would donate another one of our footballs to the orphanage after we played some matches but it wasn’t the football they were keen on…

After we had lunch, we pulled out the face painting kit that we brought. As soon as the kids saw it they all wanted to get their faces painted. We ending up staying longer than we had planned. We were glad we did because it was such a humbling experience to spend time with these children who had very little but who had a joy on their faces. No doubt this is thanks largely to the Christians working there who were taking care of these kids and had given them a hope in the gospel of Jesus.

As we travelled around the rest of this very beautiful little island we saw people living alongside the road in very poor conditions with no electricity and no running water. The contrast couldn’t have been more striking. Despite this, our kids waved enthusiastically at at the locals as we passed by and their greetings were returned all the way around with smiles and waves back. One of our kids commented later on the way home about how happy these people were even though they had very little.

Our concerns are nothing compared to the concerns of these people and yet many of us don’t seem to be as happy as they are. Ironic.

One of the features of Cambodia is the vast array of smells that are on offer. Some of the smells are quite pleasant others are unpleasantly pungent. Driving for only a few minutes in a tuk tuk you can experience a complex mix of burning incense, roasting meat, and open sewers smells.

Yesterday there was a distinct burning smell everywhere we went. My first instinct as an Australian was to think “bushfire” but of course there is no bush here in the middle of Phnom Penh. As we went about we saw people all the way down on every street standing around small metal drums burning things. Taking a closer look we saw people throwing in gold paper, wads of money (obviously fake) and even a brand new pair of shoes into the fire to be burnt.

I later discovered that this was a tradition of the Khmer people who have Chinese ancestry. They believe that burning what they they call joss or gold paper, ghost money and other items will help their ancestors in the afterlife.

The state religion here is Buddhism hence the ubiquitous Buddhist temples and monks. But in reality many people are animists believing in spirits who inhabit everything in the world. Clearly there are many here who worship their ancestors too. All of these practices are mixed up in some complex way that we are yet to get used to – just like the smells of the city. Yet another reminder that the people of Cambodia need to hear the good news of Jesus and the salvation that is in him.

It’s the wet season here in Cambodia. Most afternoons or evenings it rains but only for an hour or so..and the rain is really heavy. The other day when we were playing football and there was a massive downpour. We’ve never seen rain like it. The sound of the rain hitting the roof of the football centre was deafening.

It was too much for the kids to resist. After we finished playing indoors, they all ran outdoors to continue playing in the rain. The kids had a great time cooling off after a hot and sweaty day of ministry and football. We read before we came to Cambodia that if you embrace the wet season you will enjoy it. It’s pretty hard not to embrace it here….

Although….we soon discovered what an hour of rain typically does to the streets of Phnom Penh. It made for a much slower trip back home, especially after the girls tuk tuk stalled due to water getting into the exhaust. Cameron had to jump out of his tuk tuk and knee deep in water, help the drivers pull their tuk tuks onto higher ground to try to get the water out. We eventually found higher ground and thanks to our tuk tuk driver Dina, were able to find some back streets that weren’t as flooded. We all went out for pizza that night, including our two drivers and Jonothan (Dina’s 6yrs old son) thankful we’d survived the rain and the trip back. It made for quite an exciting adventure!

When we first began thinking about doing a short term mission overseas we looked into doing some kind of sports ministry. Unfortunately none of the options we found were suitable. After we accepted our current placement in Cambodia we were still hoping to somehow use our love of playing sport in our ministry. So we packed into our bags half a dozen deflated footballs kindly donated by Zachariah and Nathanael’s football club – the Marrickville Red Devils Academy.

At the end of our first week in Phnom Penh we were busting to get out and find some open space to kick a ball around as a family. So we went in search of grass.  This was not an easy task. First, we tried the Olympic Stadium but the grass field was only open to professional players. Eventually we found a sports centre on the road to the airport that had half-sized football fields with artificial grass that were undercover. Perfect! We had a great time as a family playing together, stretching out our legs and scoring some goals.

We then thought that this would be a great thing to do regularly with the youth. When we told the church about our idea they were delighted and said that they had been praying before we had arrived that a football competition like this could be started. So far we have had at least half a dozen youth sometimes more join us each week on Monday and Friday afternoons. Some of the younger children from the morning program have also come along and played and even our tuk tuk driver Dina.

Making connections with the locals is difficult because we can’t understand each others language but playing football with them has really helped us to make those connections more readily. We hope and pray that this will help us as we minister to them during the program in between matches.

On Friday, we ran our first day of the Children’s program. All the faithful old costumes came out as we took 2 tuk tuks to the Community centre dressed as pirates. We got even more smiles than usual as Malakai rode along with his bandana and eye patch on.

We set up the Pirate flag at the gate, hung up our Union Jack (Pommy) flag over the aim for the morning, stuck up the Blast-o-meter on the white board and set up the data projector with a pirates theme song playing. It was Kids church/Pirates of Marrickville all over again, only with the slight change of name to Pirates of Phnom Penh and the luxury of translation every couple of lines which was a much welcomed respite for Miss Rebekah Bigelow and Captain Nathanael Oates!

The Cambodian kids were great. They laughed in the right spots, our translator Sothea does a great job, and looked scared when Long Jack Cameron Pewter, the pirate pretending to be the English ships entertainment officer and cook, came on.

They all got into the actions as we sang together and they enjoyed making new friends as we played lots of games together. We all had so much fun and they seemed to really enjoy the craft too. We got lots of excited waves as they left on their tuk tuk back to their homes.

The community centre decided to fund two tuk tuks to pick up and drop off the kids as most of them can’t even afford the one way $2 fee to get to the community centre. This is not surprising when you consider that 23% of Cambodians live on less than US$1.25 a day. I’m glad they did, cause it meant all 27 who had registered for the 8 weeks came. We have been warned that it is not unusual for Cambodians to not turn up to things. After talking to some of their siblings in the youth program, it seems that some of the kids might have to help their mum selling goods in the markets or whatever work she might do. Again, this isn’t surprising when there is 37% child labour here. Kids often start school at an older age or drop out of school early depending on whether they are needed to work for their family. One of the girls we met at the youth program is 20 years old and only in Yr 11 at school. We’ll pray they will all be able to come along and enjoy spending time with us, make new friends and learn more about our great God.

After each session, we are having feedback meetings with the volunteers. We have four volunteers, 2 males, Vannak, Rotina, (both Yr 10 boys) and 2 females, Sopear (female, finishing phychology at uni) and Raksmy (doing MTS). We also have 2 translators, Sothea (who works 2 days as a dentist and 4 days at the community centre) and Sotuik (the pastor of the church). Our feedback meetings are proving to be great opportunities to teach the volunteers about why we do the things we do. None of them have ever done anything like this before and they are really keen to learn. They are also very valuable as they are the ones who can really talk to the kids and get to know them. We try and they translate for us, but there’s nothing like being Cambodian and knowing the language! As we learn how to best present the material to the kids given the language barriers, the volunteers are also learning how to put together a youth and children’s program. Everyone involved is learning and it’s proving to be a wonderful experience. As Vana said yesterday in closing at our meeting; ‘It’s beautiful to see us all working together!‘

We consider our time here ministering to the children and youth to be such an important opportunity because 37% of the Cambodian population are 12 years of age or under. The children need all the help they can get spiritually and financially so they can afford to eat and get an education and have a brighter future. We are often surprised to see how small the children are. The other day, we met a boy the same age as Zachariah, who Lily was taller than. This is not uncommon. Sonai, the manager of the community centre told me that often all the kids eat is rice. They rarely have veggies, hardly ever eat meat and maybe have a bit of fish sauce with their rice. They just don’t get the nutrients they need to grow. Yet, they smile! And we smile as we get to know them and as our children play alongside them, quickly becoming friends despite the colour of our skin, the ridiculous extremes in our standard of living, opportunities available and language barriers! Praise God that we are all one in Christ!

P.S. Thanks for praying for Bek. She finished her 60th tablet tonight and is finished her antibiotics and feeling like her usual sunny self. Poor Lily though is the latest victim to the runny tummy. She had a pretty bad night last night, so hoping and praying she’ll have a good sleep tonight. Please pray that Lily will get better quickly. Thanks…..

P.P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDPOP!

After lots of meetings with the missionaries, Vana and Inpa, the staff at NACE and the youth volunteers who would be helping us run the childrens holiday program, we finally started the program on Thursday.

The first day was the Youth program and the topic was What do you worship? We had 22 youth come and we organised lots of games, songs, Bible challenges and Cameron gave a talk on God being worthy of our worship because he made everything and everyone. The youth had lots of fun and so did we. Half of them don’t go to church, so it was a different experience for them. When they arrived, they didn’t know each other, but by the end, everyone was having fun together, including us!

Rebekah, Zac and Nat had the challenge of playing piano, guitar and bongo drum for the songs, Hannah was on the data projector and Lily, Mal and Luke helped hand things out for the games. It was a great Blair team effort with the kids stepping up in areas they normally wouldn’t feel comfortable.

Youth Skipping Game Video

Everyone we’re working with and teaching are so lovely. The youth are so friendly and the kids are really enjoying hanging out with them. Its not uncommon when we talk to them or sit next to them that they touch or rub our skin. I think this is because Cambodians seem to love white skin. There are all kinds of products you can buy at the supermarkets and pharmacies to whiten your skin. Even though it is so hot here, they all wear long shirts and trousers so they don’t get any browner from the sun….and I thought it was cultural!

I feel like I can’t say anymore without mentioning the smell! Cambodia has an aroma of it’s own. We thought living near the M5 entrance might be bad for our health! Well, that’s like living in the country compared to being on a tuk tuk in Phnom Penh. It’s pretty bad. Driving along in the tuk tuk with big old trucks roaring behind and overtaking you smells pretty bad. When you’re in the middle of traffic going every which way all around you, the fumes can be pretty intense. But it’s not just the smell of exhaust fumes, that make up the smells of the city. There is rubbish everywhere, which has it’s own type of smell, but it’s also the strong smells of the street food vendors cooking their various foods on the side of the street as you pass by. The heavy smells when driving in a tuk tuk are an experience of their own.

Despite the smells and perhaps because of them, we decided we wanted to travel around by tuk tuk. We feel like you can’t truly experience Phnom Penh unless your part of the excitement of what goes on in the traffic. The other day we were coming back from the soccer centre, when an entourage of soldiers drove past on their motorbikes blowing whistles at the motorists to get out of the way as they zoomed past looking very serious with their machine guns
casually draped over their shoulders. I was praying for safety at that point, but the kids, especially Nat thought that was pretty exciting. You couldn’t get the full experience of that sitting inside a car!

Despite this, we found out today we can’t get out of our car commitment for a month. So, unfortunately we’ll have to put those glorious, somewhat disturbing smells aside for a month, until we can get back into it again! Who would have thought….when we first arrived here, we were scared to leave the house….now it doesn’t feel like we’re part of it unless we’re breathing in the smells and chaos of the traffic! Praise God for all he is doing here!